Day: September 21, 2012

Welcome to my Naughty or Nice Giveaway Hop, which was organized by Nat @ Reading Romances! For a list of all of the participating blogs, click HERE

I am giving away a bit of a naughty book. You can win an ARC of An Affair with Mr Kennedy! This is a sizzling romance with a sexy Scotland Yard detective hero and a feisty heroine. I enjoyed this book, and I think you will, too!

London, 1887. Part stoic gentleman, part fearless Scotland Yard man, Zeno "Zak" Kennedy is an enigma of the first order. For years, the memory of a deadly bombing at King’s Cross has haunted the brilliant Scotland Yard detective. His investigation has zeroed in on a ring of aristocratic rebels whose bloody campaign for Irish revolution is terrorizing the city. When he discovers one of the treacherous lords is acquainted with his free-spirited new tenant, Cassandra St. Cloud, his inquiry pulled him unexpectedly close to the hear of the conspiracy — and into the arms of a most intriguing lady.

Cassie is no Victorian prude. An impressionist painter with very modern ideas about life and love, she is eager for a romantic escapade that is daring and discreet. She sets her sights on her dour but handsome landlord, but after she learns their meeting was not purely accidental, she hardly has a chance to forgive her lover before their passionate affair catapults them both into a perilous adventure.

To enter, fill out the widget below. Earn extra entries for following. Open to US mailing addresses only, please.

Avon is having an eBook sale! These digital romances are all on sale for $1.99 for a limited time only. Clicking the cover will take you to the Amazon product page.

Have you read any? Can you recommend any of these?

At the Duke’s Pleasure by Tracy Anne Warren

All the Byrons are just as "mad, bad, and dangerous to know" as their famous non-relation . . . but now the time has come for the eldest son to marry . . .

Edward Byron, Duke of Clybourne, has everything a man in Society needs . . . except a wife. Duty requires he wed, so he decides that a long-standing arranged marriage will do nicely. He knows his bride is beautiful, biddable, and bright enough to run his household and nursery. He expects his betrothed, Lady Claire Marsden, will be thrilled with his decision—unfortunately, she’s not!

Claire has longed for Edward since she was sixteen, but how can he expect her to agree to his proposal when he barely knows her and doesn’t love her? Nothing will convince her to accept a loveless marriage. And so she begins a battle of outrageous resistance, forcing Edward to learn that he must lose his heart in order to win his bride.

The Perils of Pleasure by Julie Anne Long

A rescued rogue . . .

Scandal has rocked the city of London. Colin Eversea, a handsome, reckless unapologetic rogue is sentenced to hang for murder and, inconveniently for him, the only witness to the crime disappears. Then again, throughout history, the Everseas have always managed to cheat fate in style: Colin is snatched from the gallows by a beautiful, clever mercenary.

A captivating captor. . .

Cool-headed, daring Madeleine Greenway is immune to Colin’s vaunted charm. Her mission is not to rescue Colin but to kidnap him, and to be paid handsomely for it. But when it becomes clear that whoever wants Colin alive wants Madeline dead, the two become uneasy allies in a deadly race for truth. Together, they’ll face great danger—and a passion neither can resist.

A Well Pleasured Lady by Christina Dodd

Prim, plain, desperately virtuous Lady Mary Fairchild stared at the seductive gentleman and wondered — did he remember the elements of the night they met? Surely not. In the ten years since, she had abandoned her youthful impetuousness and transformed herself into a housekeeper — disguising her beauty beneath a servant’s dour clothing determined to conquer the passions of the past.

But Sebastian Durant, Viscount Whitfield, did recognize her as a Fairchild, one of his family’s bitter enemies. When he demanded her help recovering a stolen diary, she dared not refuse him. When he proposed they masquerade as a betrothed couple, loyalty forced her to agree. And when the restraint between them shattered and pleasure became an obsession, Mary had to trust a powerful man who could send her to the gallows … or love her through eternity.

Guilty Pleasures by Laura Lee Guhrke

One of Daphne Wade’s guilty pleasures is to watch the Duke of Tremore as he works, shirtless, on the excavation site of his ducal estate. Anthony Courtland is by far the most exciting and handsome man she has ever known, and she dreams of one day being able to speak with him without getting tongue tied.

Anthony, meanwhile, only sees Daphne as a hard worker on his excavation team. He considers her a plain young lady and says so in a careless remark to a friend, unaware that Daphne is outside the library door, her heart shattering to pieces. So Daphne decides she will not be so silly any longer. She begins to be tutored in the social graces, forcing Anthony to see the beauty who has been right in front of his eyes.

The Pleasure of Her Kiss by Linda Needham

The dashing rogue is finally coming home to claim the exquisite stranger who is living there, a willful beauty he barely knows . . . his bride.

When the vampire tribes convene for the rare Blood Moon ceremonies, Solange’s fight with her feral nature, a mysterious stranger, family secrets and forbidden magic put all of the Drakes in danger. The POVs are: Solange, Lucy and Nicholas.

Review:

I love the Drake Chronicles, and if you had told me a few years ago that I would be eating up a YA series about vampires, I would have wondered what you had been smoking. The vampire craze never made sense to me, and I find other paranormal beings much more compelling. Give me a good zombie story, with lots of screaming and running for your life, and I’m happy. Give me a vampire story where the vamps aren’t romantic leads but terrifying, ruthless killers, and I might have been interested. But a story about a large brood of single, sexy vampire brothers (and one very confused sister), and I’m, like, yawn, so I have to thank Bloomsbury for sending the first book in this series to me, because they got me totally hooked. Thanks, Bloomsbury!!

Blood Moon picks up right were the previous installment, Bleeding Hearts, left off. Solange is losing her battle against her feral nature, and not even her BFF, Lucy, is safe in her presence. Solange is so unstable that her strong family doesn’t know what to do or how to control her. She lashes out at everyone, and she falls under the sway of Constantine, a powerful vampire with hidden goals of his own. When Nicholas goes missing, not even his sudden disappearance can mend Solange’s broken relationships long enough to find her brother.

I loved this installment, right up until the non-ending. That is non-ending number two for the series, and it’s something that tries my patience. While I am happy that there will be another book in the series, stopping this one almost in mid-sentence is disappointing. Even when a book is part of a series, I still expect each installment to have a beginning and an ending. I expect minor story arcs to get wrapped up, leaving the bigger plot thread for another day. It’s hard to recommend a book to my friends that just slams into a brick wall and ends with a “Well, see ya next time!” The momentum is lost by the time I pick up the next book in a series, and there’s an awkward period of adjustment as I struggle to remember who everyone is and what everything is about. I would rather wait until all of the pieces are released before wading into the thick of things, and I usually advise my friends to wait until a series is complete. Sorry, that’s just the way I roll. I refuse to read another George R R Martin book until A Song Ice and Fire is finished, because I hate the years and years gaps between his books, and that is probably my favorite series.

Blood Moon examines the relationship between Lucy and Solange, returning to the series’ roots. The action starts off with Lucy having to taser an ever more unstable Solange. It seems that even being her best friend is no guarantee of her safety. With Kieran bleeding to death after a ravenous Solange can’t resist feasting on his rich, enticing blood, Lucy is desperate to get him the medical attention he needs, as well as keeping herself from becoming a vampire snack. The constant push and pull between the girls was compelling; Solange doesn’t want to keep striking out at Lucy, but she just can’t help herself. With Constantine there to encourage her drinking fresh from the vein blood, she is spiraling ever faster out of control. Her hunger drives her, and she can’t quench it. And, oh, yeah, she’s hearing a voice in her head, one that urges her to think of no one but herself and to hell with the consequences.

I wish that Nicholas and Lucy had more page time together, because they are my favorite couple. Alas, he’s abducted, making cuddle time impossible. Lucy’s frantic efforts to find him are in vain, and I loved the scene on the school roof, which has her screaming out her fear, rage, and helplessness into the night air. Poor Lucy! I could feel her emotional pain, and I think I, too, would have felt so frustrated that I would have screamed uncontrollably until my eyes bled. For a girl who is accustomed to taking charge, to acting to save her friends, her helplessness was agonizing. For the first time in the series, she gives in to her fear. There is nothing she can do to save Nicholas except wait for him to be found, and that does not agree with her heart, or her personality, one little bit.

I enjoyed this outing with the Drakes right up until the non-ending, and if I had known about it, I would have held off until January, when Blood Prophesy hits stores. I am by nature impatient, so I hate these waits to see how all of the cliffhangers will play out. I’d rather hold off until the final book is released, especially for a series that I love, instead of getting annoyed by these dreaded non-endings. How do you feel about cliffhangers? Love ‘em? Hate ‘em? Leave a comment and share your thoughts about them.

Grade: B- (minor deduction for the cliffhanger ending)

Review copy purchased from Amazon (I also received a finished copy from Bloomsbury after I purchased a digital version from Amazon. I will be giving this away soon, so check back if you’re interested!)